“I’ve been imagining how they’ll write about me in a thousand years. If I do ever become Queen, what will I be? Insane?” In the new movie Spencer, this is how Kristen Stewart’s Princess Diana muses about her legacy.

Released on Friday, the film takes place over Christmas 1991 at the Sandringham Estate, one of Queen Elizabeth II’s country homes. As the Wall Street Journal notes, the movie is just one of several new projects over the last year focusing on the late princess. Diana: The Musical opens on Broadway this month. The actress who played Diana in the fourth season of The Crown was nominated for an Emmy for her role. And a six-part documentary series currently airing on CNN seeks to reframe the story of Diana’s life for a contemporary audience.

I remember vividly the news of Diana’s death in a car crash after paparazzi chased her down a Paris tunnel nearly twenty-five years ago. The tragedy reminds us again of two facts: we could die today, but our legacy will outlive us. Remembering each fact helps us prepare for the other.

Why the Astroworld tragedy is personal for me

I’ve been especially contemplating death and legacy after hearing about the Houston Astroworld tragedy Friday evening. At least eight people were killed and dozens more were injured after a large crowd began pushing toward the stage during a performance by hometown rapper Travis Scott. I grew up in Houston and have visited Astroworld numerous times across many years. But what happened in my hometown could happen in yours as well.

It seems that reminders of our mortality have dominated the news lately:

• The number of American deaths due to the pandemic exceeded 750,000 last week.
• Marília Mendonça, a Brazilian singer and Latin Grammy winner, died Friday in a plane crash on her way to a concert. She was twenty-six.
• Saturday’s oil tanker explosion in Sierra Leone killed at least ninety-eight people.
• A series of bomb threats at Yale University caused the campus to be evacuated for five hours on Friday.
• Colin Powell was laid to rest during a private ceremony at Washington National Cathedral, also on Friday.

Yesterday’s New York City Marathon was dominated by Kenyan runners Peres Jepchirchir, who won the women’s race, and Albert Korir, who won the men’s race. Some thirty thousand competitors made the 26.2-mile journey across five boroughs. Unlike their race, which ended Sunday, your race and mine are not done until we are done.

And, unlike a marathon, none of us know where the finish line is for us.

“The land of Omri”

However, it is human nature to presume that we know more about the future than we do. Has it occurred to you yet today that you could die today? As I remind you of that fact, is your response one of urgency or one of indifference?

In My Daily Pursuit, A. W. Tozer writes: “I was scheduled to preach at a certain camp meeting one time, and when I arrived, they announced a night of miracles. The only thing that happened that night was that a man drowned in the lake. People tried to revive him and keep him alive, but he never did come to. There was no miracle around that place, at least that night.”

You and I cannot calculate today either the length of our lives or the significance of our legacies.

1 Kings 16 reports that a king of Israel named Omri “bought the hill of Samaria from Shemer for two talents of silver, and he fortified the hill and called the name of the city that he built Samaria, after the name of Shemer, the owner of the hill” (v. 24). That’s the only accomplishment of Omri recorded in the text.

However, the English Standard Version Study Bible notes that “Omri’s house held the throne for over one hundred years, and the northern kingdom in due course became so identified with this dynasty that even after the Omride period it could be referred to in Assyrian records as ‘the land of Omri.’ This suggests that Omri was more a substantial international figure than could be deduced simply from 1 Kings.”

Why the difference? The author of 1 Kings records this as his true legacy: “Omri did what was evil in the sight of the Lᴏʀᴅ, and did more evil than all who were before him” (v. 25).

“All journeys have secret destinations”

The key to dealing with mortality and writing our legacy is the same: live this day fully for the Lord and trust tomorrow to his providential purpose and care.

Martin Buber was right: “All journeys have secret destinations of which the traveler is unaware.” Warren Buffett added: “Someone’s sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.” His observation is akin to Alfred North Whitehead’s assertion that great people plant trees they’ll never sit under.

If we surrender each day to Christ as our Lord, our days will become our lives and our lives will write our legacy.

Pastor Greg Laurie tells the story of this pivotal decision in the life of Billy Graham. In May 1938, Graham was heartbroken after the girl he thought he would marry broke off their relationship. He began taking nightly walks to pray. 

On one of these walks, he got down on his knees and cried, “Oh God, if you want me to serve you, I will.” 

Laurie writes: “After this decision, he experienced a newfound love and peace he’d never known before. A burden had been lifted and it gave him greater joy to serve. He saw in himself a new desire to witness and [to] share Christ, a new song in his heart and an unspeakable joy.” 

His days became his life, and his life became his legacy. 

Will you experience a “new song in your heart” today?

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Nicholas Kristof is leaving his longtime post at the New York Times to run for governor of Oregon. I could construct a significant list of issues about which I disagree with the Pulitzer Prize-winning writer. However, I commend him for his reasoning in making this move:

“I love journalism, but I also love my home state. I keep thinking of Theodore Roosevelt’s dictum: ‘It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles,’ he said. ‘The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena.’”

Noting that one-quarter of the students who rode the bus with him in elementary and high school “are dead from drugs, alcohol, and suicide—deaths of despair,” he writes: “I’m bucking the journalistic impulse to stay on the sidelines because my heart aches at what classmates have endured, and it feels like the right moment to move from covering problems to trying to fix them.”

He concludes: “I hope to convince some of you that public service in government can be a path to show responsibility for communities we love, for a country that can do better. Even if that means leaving a job I love.”

Yesterday we noted that one person inspired by Christ can change the world. Today we’ll focus on one powerful way to do this.

Why empathy is so vital

Today’s Daily Article was inspired by this headline in Forbes: “Empathy is the Most Important Leadership Skill According to Research.”

Tracy Brower’s article notes that empathy is especially important these days because “people are experiencing multiple kinds of stress, and data suggests it is affected by the pandemic—and the ways our lives and our work have been turned upside down.” Some examples:

• A global study found 42 percent of people experienced a decline in mental health. Specifically, 67 percent are experiencing increases in stress; 57 percent have increased anxiety; 54 percent are emotionally exhausted; 53 percent are sad; and 50 percent are irritable.
• Another study reported that our sleep is compromised when we feel stressed at work.
• A third study found workplace incivility is rising, with extensive effects that include reduced performance and collaboration, deteriorating customer experiences, and increased turnover.

By contrast, when leaders are empathetic, their employees are much more likely to be innovative, engaged in their work, retained by their companies, feel included in their workplace, and navigate the demands of work and life successfully.

The article encourages leaders to consider the thoughts of others through cognitive empathy (“If I were in his/her position, what would I be thinking right now?”) and emotional empathy. (“Being in his/her position would make me feel _______.”) They should also inquire directly about the challenges their employees are facing, then listen to their responses.

A friend’s wise advice

Nicholas Kristof writes that he is running for governor of Oregon out of empathetic concern for his home state and its people. It would seem appropriate for me to encourage Christians to follow his example by serving everyone we can with empathy for their needs and struggles.

God’s word does, in fact, teach that when we serve the hungry, thirsty, lonely, naked, and imprisoned, we are serving Jesus (Matthew 25:35–40). Our Lord exhorted us: “If anyone would be first, he must be last of all and servant of all” (Mark 9:35, my emphasis). And Peter adds: “As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace” (1 Peter 4:10).

However, this call to empathetic service is more nuanced than it might first appear. Peter continues: “Whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies” (v. 11). In other words, we are to serve within our gifts and abilities by the strength God gives those who answer his call.

It is also true that our service should be directed by our Lord, not by the needs around us. Paul’s Macedonian vision led him west instead of east (Acts 16:6–10), but this made the needs of the region he left no less real. Oswald Chambers noted: “Our Lord’s primary obedience was to the will of his Father, not to the needs of people—the saving of people was the natural outcome of his obedience to the Father.”

A wise friend once told me, “Their need does not constitute your call.”

“On purpose for a purpose”

Before we can serve where God intends us to serve, we must know where God intends us to serve. We can trust his omniscience and perfect will (a fact I discussed in a recent personal blog about Baylor’s football victory over the University of Texas). In fact, the older we get, the more urgently we need to seek and follow our Father’s leading (a fact I discussed in my latest personal blog).

In You Were Made for This Moment, Max Lucado focuses on the dramatic scene in Esther 4 where Mordecai encourages Esther to intercede with the king on behalf of her Jewish people. She explains, “If any man or woman goes to the king inside the inner court without being called, there is but one law—to be put to death, except the one to whom the king holds out the golden scepter so that he may live” (v. 11).

Mordecai replies, “If you keep silent at this time, relief and deliverance will rise for the Jews from another place, but you and your father’s house will perish. And who knows whether you have not come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” (v. 14). In response, Esther agrees to go to the king “though it is against the law, and if I perish, I perish” (v. 16).

Lucado then writes: “What took Esther from ‘If I go, I’ll perish’ to ‘If I perish, I perish’? It had to be Mordecai’s straightforward message: ‘You were placed here on purpose for a purpose.’

“So were you, my friend. What if you, like Esther, have an opportunity to act in a way that will bless your people more than you can imagine? This is your moment.”

He continues: “The question is not ‘Will God prevail?’ The question is ‘Will you be part of the team?’ Heaven will offer each one of us the privilege of participating in the holy work. When your invitation comes, may you find the same courage Esther found and make the same decision Mordecai made. Relief will come. May God help you and me to be a part of it.”

Like Esther, you have come to the kingdom “for such a time as this.”

What “holy work” is God inviting you to join today?

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Republican Glenn Youngkin defeated Democrat Terry McAuliffe in yesterday’s Virginia governor’s race.

Why am I leading today’s Daily Article with this story? I don’t live in Virginia. The odds are that you don’t, either. Gubernatorial races are typically only news inside the states where they are contested. Governor-elect Youngkin will not cast votes in the congressional disputes of our day, render opinions on Supreme Court decisions, or influence the White House in any direct way.

And yet, his race generated national headlines over the last several weeks as he and his opponent drew into a virtual tie going into yesterday’s election.

One reason is that the Virginia contest was widely viewed as a referendum on Joe Biden’s presidency. In fact, The Hill called it a “proxy war between Trump and Biden.” Another is that national issues such as abortion and vaccine mandates have permeated the race.

Yet another is the divisiveness of our political season. Gerald F. Seib writes in the Wall Street Journal that “there are effectively four political parties in Washington now” and “there is zero trust among them.” There are the progressive Democrats, personified by Sen. Bernie Sanders, and the moderate version, personified by Sen. Joe Manchin. Then there is the traditionally conservative “governing” part of the GOP and the “populist, nationalist version of the Republican Party.”

The bipartisan infrastructure plan created earlier this year is an example of the moderate Democrats and the “governing” Republicans working together. However, the current standoff regarding its future exemplifies the lack of trust between the four “parties” in Washington.

Using skateboards to win souls

In a day as divisive and chaotic as ours, what difference can one person make? All the difference in the world. In fact, the more conflicted our culture, the more one person can stand out as a unique harbinger of hope.

For example, John Barnard is the founder of Middleman Ministries, a partner of Columbus Avenue Baptist Church in Waco. His ministry gives away custom-made skateboards and other equipment to teenagers on the margins of society. They conduct skating clinics and outreaches in skating parks and also pair adult Christian mentors with young people, sometimes bonding by working together on old vans. Middleman then donates the vans to other skateboarding ministries around the country.

In honor of the traditional founding of the Protestant Reformation on October 31, Christian Post ran a terrific article on seven women who were vital to this transformational movement. Here we learn about Marie Dentière, a former nun who led other nuns into the Reformation cause, wrote apologetic works in defense of Reformed theology, and was even asked by John Calvin to write the foreword for one of his printed sermons.

We meet Argula von Grumbach, who was born to a Bavarian noble family and became so famous for her defense of the Reformation that Martin Luther complimented her “valiant fight with great spirit, boldness of speech, and knowledge of Christ.” And Katharina Zell, sometimes called the “Mother Reformer,” whose marriage to a Protestant pastor in 1525 is believed to be one of the first official Protestant marriages in European history. She wrote works defending clerical marriage and commentaries on Scripture and cared extensively for Protestant refugees.

You and I may not be familiar with their stories, but their faithfulness in the midst of epochal change, controversy, and opposition changed history and advanced God’s kingdom on earth.

How to “turn the world upside down”

You don’t have to run for governor for your life to impact our culture. Nor do you have to help lead a reformation for your faith to change eternity. But you do need to make a countercultural decision today that will affect your life and your legacy far beyond today.

God wants to use your life and mine to change our world for Christ. From the first Christians to now, he wants to empower and employ his followers to “turn the world upside down” with the gospel (cf. Acts 17:6).

If he is not using us as transformational salt and light, the fault is with the salt and light (cf. Matthew 5:13–16). This is because the Holy Spirit is the Holy Spirit; our sins grieve him and quench his power in our lives (Ephesians 4:30; 1 Thessalonians 5:19). He can only use us to the degree that we are usable.

Unfortunately, many Christians think that so long as their sins are private and personal, they are affecting no one but themselves. But nothing could be further from the truth.

Who is the “builder of your destiny”?

You and I literally cannot know the ways God’s Spirit would have used our lives if we were more usable. We cannot know the impact we forfeit on earth and the reward we lose in heaven when we spend even a minute or an hour outside his leadership and empowerment.

Of course, Satan does not want us to know this. He tries to tempt us into self-reliance, using means that resonate with our secular culture and with our internal “will to power,” which can be extremely deceptive. As an example, James Allen claims in his influential book As A Man Thinketh that by our thoughts, a person is “the maker of his character, the molder of his life, and the builder of his destiny.” (For more, see my review of his important book on my personal website.)

In fact, the Holy Spirit wants to make our character to reflect Christ (Romans 8:29), mold our life as we manifest his “fruit” (Galatians 5:22–23), and build our destiny as world-changers for eternity. When we are fully his, he will use our gifts, talents, abilities, education, and influence to advance God’s kingdom in ways we will not fully understand this side of eternity.

The key is for us to want to make a difference so passionately that we will pay the personal price for public usefulness.

The more we understand all Jesus has done for us, the more we will want him to do for others what he has done for us. And the more we will want to serve him in gratitude for such grace.

Corrie ten Boom, the Nazi holocaust survivor and Christian ambassador to the world, once prayed: “Lord, you died for me. What can I do for you?”

Will you make her prayer yours today?

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